On Saturday night itself, after Punjab Kings beat Lucknow Super Giants, the equation had become even tougher for the Kolkata Knight Riders. And by the time their final league game versus Delhi Capitals at Eden Gardens on Sunday was into its second over, the Knights knew their chances of making the playoffs were over.
Rajasthan Royals' 30-run win over Mumbai Indians at the Wankhede earlier in the evening had crushed the Knights' hopes.
The Knights' campaign ended with a defeat. The Capitals signed off with a 40-run win. In reply to the Capitals' 203/5 after they were put in, KKR could manage only 163 to finish seventh.
"We'll discuss the things we did right and the areas of improvement in due course of time. We didn't capitalise on those fine moments in the first half," KKR skipper Ajinkya Rahane said after the match.
The KKR players lacked motivation, it seemed. Rinku Singh, usually a pretty safe catcher, dropped a regulation chance at backward point in the sixth over to let Sahil Parakh off.
For the Capitals, KL Rahul (60 off 30 balls) and skipper Axar Patel (39 off 25 balls) were their chief contributors with the bat. During the run chase, Rahane (63 off 39 balls) top-scored for the Knights, only to perish again at a critical stage of the game.
Capitals' Kuldeep Yadav (3/29) finally had some reason to smile, though keeper Abishek Porel's poor work denied him a hat-trick.
Laser show
At the innings break, the Cricket Association of Bengal organised a laser show, which paid tribute to India’s 1983 World Cup triumph, former captains Kapil Dev and Sourav Ganguly (also CAB president), the 2001 Eden Test triumph over Australia, former association president Jagmohan Dalmiya and a few others. Surprisingly, the laser show didnt' feature former India keeper-batter Wriddhiman Saha and Women’s ODI World Cup winner Richa Ghosh.
Sunil Gavaskar was quite critical after the CAB had staged a laser show during the India-West Indies T20 World Cup game earlier this year. “It’s not easy on the batters, or anybody for that matter,” Gavaskar had said.
It seems the CAB turned a deaf ear to the former captain.
